1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a content server and layout system, which merges a template with selected content to lay it out on a document based on, e.g., an instruction from a client, and send the merged document to the client.
2. Description of the Related Art
In recent years, a Web system which delivers digital brochures that are customized according to a user's preference is available. With this system, the user selects a template and a content to be merged with that template on a Web page provided by a Web server, and a client receives a digital document as a result. Note that merging data (content data) with a template is to lay out the content data according to a layout defined by the template. Therefore, when the content data is merged with the template, already laid-out content data as a combination of the content data and layout data indicating its layout is generated.
A content server which manages and provides contents and templates forms a part of such a system.
The above system uses an automatic layout system to generate a digital document according to a user's choice. The automatic layout system can change the sizes of containers which are to be filled with contents, and container intervals. In this way, images, and the like, the sizes of containers laid out on a template and the distance between neighboring containers can be changed in accordance with the volume of a content such as text. For this reason, the automatic layout system can generally support various volumes of contents and combinations of these contents by a single template. Note that a container is a frame defined in a template, and contents such as text, images, and the like are laid out in that frame.
However, in the automatic layout system, data beyond the assumed variable settings set for each container and between containers may be merged depending on differences in the contents, variations of combinations of contents, or the like. In this case, layout errors such as text overflow (text cannot fall within a container), image overflow (image data cannot fall within a container), and the like may occur.
Some template editors comprise a proofing function that makes so-called preflight inspection so as to allow the user to check occurrence of layout errors and to re-edit a template so as to apply corrections against layout errors. The preflight inspection is that for an actual operation, and includes an inspection for checking whether or not the system operates normally using test data. That is, from the technical viewpoint, the preflight inspection of the automatic layout system is the same as its normal use. The purpose of the operation of the preflight inspection lies in inspection of content data or template data unlike the normal use. The preflight inspection will also be simply referred to as “preflight” hereinafter.
In the preflight inspection of the automatic layout system with the proofing function, test data of content is merged with the template to experimentally lay out the data. Then, the preflight inspection result is displayed for the user.
A user as a template editor re-edits the template while observing the preflight inspection result, and changes variable setting values and levels which are set for each container or between containers so as to obtain a template free from any layout errors.
The user as the template editor downloads contents to be applied to a template from the content server, and makes creation and editing operations of a template free from any layout errors using this proofing function.
A user as a content server administrator uploads and registers the template free from any layout errors created by the template editor to the content server. The registered template is set and allocated to be selectable on a Web page by the user who requests a digital document from a Web client.
The automatic layout system of documents is described in, e.g., Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 2005-216174 and the like. As a technique that notifies clients of update on the Internet, an RSS (RDF (Resource Description Framework) site summary) technique is known (for example, see Dan Brickley and other 10 members, “RDF Site Summary (RSS) 1.0”, May 30, 2001, RSS-DEV Working Group, [searched on Mar. 17, 2005], Internet <URL: http://purl.org/rss/1.0/spec>, and M. Nottingham and R. Sayer Ed., “The Atom Syndication Format draft-ietf-atompub-froamat-03”, Oct. 20, 2004, RSS-DEV Working Group, [searched on Mar. 17, 2005], Internet <URL: http://atompub.org/2004//10/20/draft-ietf-atompub-froamat-03.html>.
In this automatic layout system, the content server administrator adds and updates content data to be handled by the content server as needed. For this reason, the template which has been edited to be free from any layout error using the proofing function is more likely to cause layout errors due to a new content or a combination of new and existing contents after it is registered in the server.
In the prior art, when the layout errors have occurred after registration of the template in the server, an error log upon layout, which is recorded by the server is checked to specify a template that causes problems, and that template must be corrected. In this case, the administrator further specifies, from the log, content data which has caused problems in that template, and the merging order of the content data with the template. The administrator downloads the specified content data from the content server by manually designating an editor environment. For the template re-edit operation, the administrator further manually designates the arrangement order of the content data to reproduce a proofing error in the editor. Such time-consuming procedures are required. For this reason, when proofing errors of different cases have occurred in a single template or there are many templates which have caused problems, the re-edit operations for correcting the templates require much labor.